A new home for SketchUp
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@unknownuser said:
This is what I hear with ear to the ground. Don't quote me. My hearing is bad
At the top of their list is a plan to capture ruby revenue. A panel will choose a select group of rubies and start to negotiate with the owners. This ruby set will be provided with a permanent front end in SU. You can bet they will be in the positioning application vertical.Since they are trying to capture a ruby revenue stream they will create a STK that must be used to develop and install/register. You will have to use their kit.
Then look for a complete name change in the new year. Trimble will attempt to raise the profile from blue jeans to shirt and tie. The “sketchy” reputation is something they will quickly position themselves to resolve. As for the name change. No serious Sketchup user will drop the tool because of a name change but new customers will turn their heads. The word Sketchup will disappear forever.
Set your browser to http://www.forums.trimble-u-cation.com….....lol
Is this just pure guesswork or do you have something to back this up with?
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I just sat down over my morning cappuchino and read this thread from front to back again, and was left with one overwhelming thought. You guys are awesome. Really.
Change is tough for everyone and there's every reason to fear that things could go completely pear-shaped at any moment. There's no way to say for sure what will happen. We're making some sausage here, and that isn't always the most elegant thing to watch.
But we've been making SketchUp-style sausage for a long time now and have survived many adversities. We've had a fair measure of success, too. There is absolutely no rational reason why a tiny little startup like ours should have been able to stand up against entrenched industry mega-competitors. The reason it has worked is... you guys— the designers, builders and makers of things. The people who worry about us.
If you're worried, then I'm confident. People who could care less if we make it don't 'worry'— they just don't show up at all. And one thing we know for sure is that people actually use SketchUp. They are showing up in droves, as it turns out.
Hang in there— this is going to be... fun!
john
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I'm really interested to see how it goes. I have every confidence it'll be good.
Glad you are staying with the team as well as the rest who are.
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No info about price of Pro Version ?
Increase / decrease / stable ? -
@unknownuser said:
No info about price of Pro Version ?
Increase / decrease / stable ?It seems kind of early for that sort of info, doesn't it?
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Good news Sketchup moved away from Google. Google was not in any way a CAD company. I see that Trimble also has Tekla. Tekla has a good reputation here in the Netherlands for Civil engineering software and is the biggest competitor for Revit. That is for the field of construction and engineering. From what I have heard Tekla has better integrated 3D modelling and 2Doutput than Revit.
With 30 millions users things are not going to change overnight. I hope the long term brings us a much better 3D modeller in terms of speed and integration with renderapplications and 2D output. Revit is showing architects are more and more involved in 3D modeling combined with BIM engineering. Sketchup has not evolved at all in that direction yet. With Trimble we might see a more serious attempt to model and engineer with Sketchup.
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ummm... wow.
chris<pixelmonkey>:D -
I've been told that SU will be greatly simplified.
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@unknownuser said:
Then look for a complete name change in the new year. Trimble will attempt to raise the profile from blue jeans to shirt and tie. The “sketchy” reputation is something they will quickly position themselves to resolve. As for the name change. No serious Sketchup user will drop the tool because of a name change but new customers will turn their heads. The word Sketchup will disappear forever.
Set your browser to http://www.forums.trimble-u-cation.com….....lol
I would doubt that the name would change. 10 years of brand recognition. While many companies are re-branding, Comcast to XFinity, QWest to CenturyLink, as examples, usually its because of negative public sentiment with the Brand.
30 million downloads and 2 million active users for a 3D modeling program is great Brand recognition. -
..no not fully guess work but for the name change.
Trimble is about to baptise The 3Dwarehouse and GE.
@unknownuser said:
the SketchUp engine will be integrated into Trimble's current solutions in its Engineering and Construction, Field Solutions and Mobile Solutions segments.
I think it will be all good but the focus is moving with a big step towards engineering. Those that have turned GE and the warehouse into assets (in whatever disipline) are going to win big.
On the tool kit...So far it has been an extravaganza. There will have to be a more unified approach to the new core....Engineers are not going to except that your ruby could damage their infrastucture. This will be good for ruby developers although it will require more scrutiny of the ruby supply chain.
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Is it just coincidence that some of the more negative and sceptical comments come from people relatively new to this forum...and probably the software. I see that one of them signed up today, presumably to specifically post a downer...4 minutes after joining. Others have devoted almost all their limited number of posts so far to this single topic.
We've heard all this before when Google acquired @Last..."They'll kill it off." "They'll ruin it then dump it." "Better learn Blender/Modo/Hexagon/Wings3D/Rhino/Max/Insert Program of Choice."
Development under Google wasn't always as rapid as I'd have liked, or always in directions that were relevant to me personally...but SU is unquestionably streets ahead now from where it was then.
I fully expect to be using this software for years to come, producing assets for everyone from architecture through interior design and landscaping to movie previz; and I fully expect it to keep improving its capabilities in those areas.
There's nothing in any information currently available that would lead you to think otherwise...unless you deliberately go out of your way to put the worst possible interpretation on everything. -
Well said, Alan.
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@jbacus said:
Since this deal hasn't yet closed, there are specific legal restrictions that control what Trimble can say. That's why you don't see them here. Until then, you'll have to be satisfied with what's said on this site. You should expect to see more information added there as things progress.
John, we're really glad you are here answering questions, and we know you and the team are apparently all really happy with what has been promised/offered to you. It's not that we don't trust you, we (certainly I) haven't seen anything so far that gives mea any reason to trust Trimble. They may be good guys, but their website is a mess and it doesn't relate to to or engage end user customers in the slightest. It's vague, unfriendly, difficult to find stuff, and full of commercial speak that is almost meaningless
We've all seen mergers before where the staff are all really pleased, because it often means job security and direction, where previously it was lacking, and sometimes it also means more money. However, I've tried to look at what the company already does, as a means of giving me confidence that these are the guys to push SU forwards in ways we have all been dreaming of.
So far it's not looking good. No screenshots, no Mac versions, no galleries, no nice friendly product pages, no forums, no awe-inspiring 3d software portfolio. This is the public face of a company that is principally known for making survey equipment, and they think we're going to be enthused about the takeover on this basis? They don't even speak the same language! This sentence, "SketchUp and the 3D Warehouse, together with other Trimble Tools from Accubid, HHK, Meridian, Plancal, QuickPen, Tekla, Trimble Business Center and the Trimble Connected Community will provide a stand-alone and enterprise solution that will enable an integrated and seamless workflow to reduce rework and improve productivity for the customer" gives us some clues about some of the other apps Trimble have.
However they are a disparate bunch of totally separate applications, mainly related to building services, with minimal information about any of them and no evidence of a consistent corporate branding or integration strategy. Without exception, all the websites for these products are uniformly awful. How is this integration going to work? Obviously that's rhetorical
Are they proposing to make Mac versions of all their applications, or drop the SU Mac version, or basically leave the Mac version to stagnate without the stuff they are proposing to integrate.Most of us don't use 'field data models' and aren't terribly excited about 'project management tools'. We love SketchUp because it's creative, fun and easy.
I don't buy the argument that Trimble can't or won't say anything until the deal is done. What on earth is wrong with coming out with a nice reassuring statement saying something like, "Hi, we're Trimble, you might not have heard of us, but we've been doing this and that for such and such years, we're really excited to be taking on SketchUp, we know there is a vibrant community, we would like to reassure you that we aren't planning to kill off all the cool stuff. We love your enthusiasm and we're really looking forward to working with you all to make SketchUp a better product, with more relevance (or whatever) to you all for the future." Not exactly going to make the shareholders or investors run for the hills is it?
I'm not totally averse to the idea of integrating some new functionality from existing applications into a more advanced, building-specific version of SketchUp, with better support for site survey data and with integrated modules for structural and building services design in a BIM-type IFC compliant wrapper. I'm just not totally convinced that Trimble are the people to do it well without losing the things about SketchUp we all love.
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I always think that change is cathartic, and I am guardedly optimistic about this announcement. I was less than enthused about Google buying out @last, and certainly some of my initial fears turned out to be spot on.
Development of SU core features has been less than earth shattering under the Google watch. Yes, they fixed the shadow bug, solid tools was a great addition, layout was at least released finally, and the geo-locating is certainly useful. All great things individually, but, looked at over the time span of 6 years, it is a little lean.
However, the lack of meaningful development of Layout has been very disappointing to me, and, if not for all of our fantastic plug-in ninjas, the core features of SU have changed very little in the past 5-6 years. Performance has had incremental increases, which have been greatly appreciated from my end, but we all know that SU has a long way to go before it can really perform at a pro level for large poly models.
I always had the feeling that the development team was never given the freedom and cash to push push push.
This forum is littered with requests that have gone noticed but not at all acted on. I spent a lot of time compiling and posting about things I thought Layout could fine tune, and there was great response from the guys in Boulder, but, in the end, nothing changed. I fear for the future of Layout much more than I fear for the future of Sketchup. While I use it exclusively to generate my shop drawings and blueprints, the process has an undertone of frustration with the clunky dimensioning, shocking lack of hatching (are you kidding me?) and terrible performance in vector mode. and page numbering, hahaha.
The places where I thought SU could improve the most seem, on the surface anyway, as more likely to be addressed by Trimble than they were by Google. But, one wonders about a company that has been swallowing companies like a shark in a pool (3 already in 2012!) The idea of being able to integrate and making meaningful upgrades all while either subsuming or attempting to maintain myriad corporate structures and attitudes sounds incredibly difficult. It sure seems like Trimble decided to carve out a huge swath of BIM/GIS market share; what is less obvious is what they are going to do with all this new stuff and user base.
I guess I can stop holding my breath for a layout update anytime soon. Sigh... but with fingers crossed
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I really can't believe that people judge a company by just looking at their web site! Google doesn't even have a company site! You probably would have preferred Adobe to buy SU, right? Do you think it would be a free version anymore?
No one can tell today what SU will become tomorrow, so all the words and the apprehention is both useless and early, to me.
Let's use our SU v8 for now. We'll see how v9 will be.
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@bigstick said:
ommercial speak that is almost meaningless
What on earth is wrong with coming out with a nice reassuring statement saying something like, "Hi, we're Trimble, you might not have heard of us, but we've been doing this and that for such and such years, we're really excited to be taking on SketchUp, ."
They probably thought they did say that in their own way. You can see by their copy that they have professional marketing staff. That's how it typically comes out sounding.
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I remember when Google bought @Last. I was having pretty regular conversations with various SU Team members at @Last. Then one day is just stopped. Then an announcement is made that Google bought @Last. Then the @Last forums disappeared. I never got the message that it was migrating to Google Groups.
Never got an offical word of reassurance from Google about the acquisition and it took me 6 months to find SketchUcation where all the familiar people moved too. Many things changed after that some good but not all. A wall appeared between the SketchUp community and the SU team. It was not the SketchUp teams desire to do so but that was a Google directive. It took a little while to reconnect with various SU (now Google) team people.
SO, not having a Trimble official here to allay fears is not unusual . What are the fears here? SketchUp is not going away. But change for SketchUp is good . They did not go to Autodesk who would kill it or Apple who would try and make Siri model for you or Dessualt who would transform it into SketchUp Solids.
Trimble by all accounts is aligned with SketchUps core goal of a modeling tool for architecture and related industries. Yes, they have a website that is clearly directed towards engineering and products most of us have never heard. They have more in common with SU then Google ever did. Google had Earth but nothing else even related to what SketchUp was about.
The communication now , while not answering all our questions, is appreciated and we should take it at face value. The answers and changes will come. Even if someone from Trimble was here to tell us their plans I would have to wonder if they really knew. The fact that John is here talking should be a sign that the SU team is excited, cares about the product and is hearing what we are saying (John has echoed this).
The only other thing to do is be patient and stay engaged. Just my 2 cents.
Peace
Daniel Tal -
Chuck,
I've followed your work some, and you obviously know what you are doing. It's interesting you exclusively use LO when there are so many full CAD packages to choose from--and you don't like it. I too have hopes for LO and there are examples of users sucessfully embracing it as you do. Given the nature of SU--Layout looks like a robust addition to output from the simple SU format, added free to Pro users ($500 software at that). I am not critical, just interesting...
I also expressed a question how this could affect the next version schedule, but then where's the reason it should affect it at all? It could also mean: "Hey you guys are about to make an excellent update, Let's get that rolling as the SU version that introduces Trimble."
Regards, Peter
For those who rankle at Trimble's form in the announcement--here is a Cnet news snippet from when Google acquired AtLast:
@unknownuser said:
Terms of the deal were not disclosed and Google declined to further elaborate on the deal, other than to point to its company blog.
A Google spokeswoman, however, noted: "We can confirm that we have acquired @Last, and we are happy to welcome their talented team to Google."
I think few consumers are fully satisfied with the corporate approach. That's how it is.
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